Transcript

Working #1152 · From Chad

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The work is the shortcut. There's a story behind that.
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This is your daily message from Chad #1152 to upgrade your
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mental game today by telling yourself a better story.
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Because the most important story you hear is the story you tell
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yourself. This message is dedicated to
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Jamie Lynn Austell Smith, the hardest worker I know.
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Here's the upgrade. You may be hunting for the
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shortcut, but upgraded. Think he knows the work is the
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shortcut. Here's the story.
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Most people celebrate their birthday.
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John D Rockefeller celebrated a different day, more.
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He called it Job Day, September 26th, 1855.
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It was his personal holiday. He had a commemorative flag
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flown over his home and it marked the occasion.
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That of the day he said gave him identity, independence in the
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path out of the instability of his upbringing.
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See, Rockefeller's childhood was unstable.
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His father was a con man who came and went.
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His mother held the family together and when he was 16 he
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moved to Cleveland and made one thing his full time occupation
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to find work. He went door to door to banks,
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railroads, merchants, Commission houses.
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He made a list of businesses to pursue and he asked to speak to
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whoever was in charge. He did this six days a week for
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six straight weeks and when he ran out of businesses he started
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the list over and walked it again.
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He later called it quote, the business of looking for work in
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quote. Rejection didn't discourage him.
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It made him more determined. And then on September 26th, a
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Cleveland Commission house called Hewitt and Tuttle hired
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him as a bookkeeper. He was hired for about a dollar
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a day. A dollar a day.
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And Rockefeller treated it as the hinge his whole life turned
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on. He said his entire future seemed
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to depend on that day. He wondered for the rest of his
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life what would have happened if he hadn't gotten it.
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So every year after, he celebrated September 26th as Job
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Day. It was a bigger day than his
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birthday, more than an anniversary, because his
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birthday was handed to him. Job Day he earned.
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And here's what he did with it. He didn't act like a 16 year old
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clerk. He acted like he owned the
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place. He checked every bill.
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He mastered the books. He learned the business better
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than the men above them. That diligence made the next
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door open and the next all the way to Standard Oil.
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He wasn't waiting for the shortcut.
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The work was the shortcut. It gave him identity,
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independence and a way out. Dorothy Sayers once argued that
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work isn't the curse we treat it as.
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It's not just something we endure to get to the weekend.
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It's meant to be done for the love of doing a thing well worth
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doing. The work itself is the reward.
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You keep looking for the thing that comes after the work, the
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break, the connection, the lucky day that the work is the thing
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that makes the luck. Work doesn't have to be
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something you get paid for either, just the use of your
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abilities and a thing worth doing.
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Rockefeller went looking for a job for six weeks and the
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looking was already the work that made him who he was.
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The better story to tell yourself is the work is the
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shortcut. Tell me a story of your own job
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day to from chadsmith@gmail.com. Send someone a text and ask them
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what's the day you'd celebrate more than your birthday.
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You can get a free copy of my book, The Most Powerful Story in
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the World, by going to from chad.gumroad.com.
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The transcript of this message and hundreds of others are
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always available at www.fromchad.com.